Before you start, make sure you are logged into the correct Snapchat account on your phone. Snapchat will send your data export to the email address linked to your account, so make sure you have access to that inbox. The export can include your friends list, user information, chat history, memories, and more depending on what you select. This guide walks you through every single tap from your profile screen to the final export confirmation.
Safety First
You never need to share your Snapchat password with any third-party website or app to get your data. Snapchat has a fully official, built-in data export tool inside its own settings. If any app or website claims it can show your Snapchat friends, best friends list, or activity by asking you to "connect your Snapchat" or log in through their platform, that is a credential risk. Do not do it. Everything in this guide stays entirely within the official Snapchat app on your phone.
Step 1. Open Your Snapchat Profile
Tap your Bitmoji or profile icon in the top-left corner of Snapchat.
Open the Snapchat app on your iPhone or Android phone. On the main camera screen, tap your profile picture or Bitmoji icon in the top-left corner. This opens your profile page, which shows your Snap score, Snapchat+ subscription status, your stories, and your friends list.
Step 2. Tap the Settings Gear Icon
Tap the gear icon in the top-right corner of your profile page.
Once you are on your profile page, look at the top-right corner of the screen. You will see a gear icon there. Tap it to open Snapchat's Settings page. This is where all your account preferences, privacy controls, and data options are managed.
Step 3. Search for "My Data"
Tap the search bar at the top of Settings and type "my data".
On the Settings page, there is a search bar at the very top that says "Search settings." Tap it and type my data. Snapchat will instantly show a result called My Data with the label "Privacy controls" underneath it. Tap the My Data result. This is the quickest way to find the data export tool without scrolling through the entire settings menu.
Step 4. Select the Data You Want to Include
On the "Data available for download" page, toggle on the categories you need.
After tapping My Data, you will land on a page titled Data available for download. Step 1 of the export process is labeled Select data to include and shows how many categories are currently selected out of 10 available. The categories you can toggle on or off are:
Export your Memories covers your saved Snaps and photos stored in Memories.
Export JSON files is toggled on by default and is the most important one to keep enabled. This covers data portability files.
User information includes Login details, Snapchat+, User Profile, Public Profile, Account history, Friends list, Bitmoji data, and Connected apps. This is the category you need if you want your friends list.
Chat history covers your Snap history, Chat history, Talk history, and Communities.
Spotlight covers your Spotlight submissions and activity.
Shopping includes your Purchase history, subscriptions, orders, shopping favourites, payments, and Snap Tokens.
Support history covers Support history, Terms history, in-app surveys, reported content, and email campaign history.
For most people who want to check their friends and account data, make sure Export JSON files and User information are both toggled on. Toggle on any other categories you need and then scroll down to continue to Step 2.
Step 5. Choose "All time" as the Date Range
On the date range screen, select "All time" and confirm your email address.
Step 2 of the export process is titled Choose date range, confirm email address. You will see a calendar and a list of quick date range options on the right side: Yesterday, Last week, Last month, Last year, 2 years, and All time. Tap All time to make sure your export includes every piece of data since you created your account. There is also a toggle at the top asking if you want to export data from a specific date range. If you leave this toggle on, you can pick a custom range using the calendar. If you want everything, tap All time on the right side.
Below the calendar, you will see a field to Confirm your email address. Make sure the email shown is the one you want to receive the export notification at. If you need to change it, tap the field and update it. When everything looks correct, tap the Submit button at the bottom right.
Step 6. Your Export Is Now In Progress
Snapchat confirms your request and shows "In progress" status.
After tapping Submit, Snapchat moves to Step 3 of the export flow labeled Export progress. The page will show your export under a Your exports section with the date and time it was created and a status of In progress. The page also shows a message saying: "Snapchat is creating a copy of files. This process can take a long time (possibly hours or days) to complete. You'll receive an email when your export is ready."
You can safely close the app now. Your export is queued and running in the background. You do not need to keep the app open.
Step 7. Wait for the Email and Download Your File
Check your email for a notification from Snapchat and tap the download link.
Once your export is ready, Snapchat sends an email to the address you confirmed in Step 5. The email will contain a download link for your data file. Open the email and tap the link to download your Snapchat data. The file will be a ZIP archive containing JSON files with all the data categories you selected. Save it to your device and do not share it with anyone since it contains private account information.
Troubleshooting
You cannot find "My Data" in Settings. Use the search bar inside Settings and type "my data" as shown in Step 3. It will appear instantly under Privacy controls.
The Submit button is greyed out. Make sure you have at least one data category toggled on in Step 4 and that your email address is confirmed in Step 5.
The email notification never arrived. Check your spam or junk folder. If it has been more than 48 hours and there is still nothing, open Snapchat, go back to My Data, and check the Your exports section to see the current status. You can also try submitting a new export request.
The download link in the email expired. Snapchat download links do not stay active forever. If your link has expired, go back to Settings, search for My Data, and submit a new export request.
You want only your friends list. In Step 4, make sure only Export JSON files and User information are toggled on. User information includes your complete friends list. This keeps the file size small and the export fast.
The export says it may take days. This is normal for large accounts, especially if you have Memories or Chat history toggled on. If you only need friends data, toggle off Memories and Chat history to speed things up significantly.
What to Do With Your Snapchat Data
Once you have the ZIP file saved on your device, you can open it to review everything Snapchat has stored about your account. The JSON files inside will contain your complete friends list with added and removed friends, your user profile details, your account history, your login activity, your Bitmoji data, and any other categories you chose to export. If you are using a tool that reads Snapchat friend data, drop the ZIP file into that tool and it will process everything locally inside your browser without uploading your data to any external server.